1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to a catalyst, a manufacturing method of the catalyst, a method of carbon dioxide (CO2) reduction using the catalyst, a method of heavy metal reduction using the catalyst, and a method of hydrogenation of organic compounds. In particular, the present invention relates to an oxysulfide catalyst including copper.
2. Description of Related Art
Recently, global warming and climate change has become a huge threat to the environment. Therefore, CO2 emission is an important issue awaiting to be solved worldwide. In particular, a method of converting CO2 into methanol (CH3OH) using ruthenium (Ru) metal complex has been proposed. However, such mechanism requires external energy, such as external high power light sources, to trigger the reaction. Therefore, it is difficult to conduct the conversion at room temperature and atmosphere pressure. High power light sources not only impose a burden on the cost of the conversion, but also raise safety issues on a scale-up production system. Therefore, providing catalyst which enables elimination of CO2 while being cost effective has become a topic to be researched in the field.
One of the heavy metal ions with highly toxic property is hexavalent chromium (Cr(VI)) which is widely used in industrial activities such as plastic, leather, textile, metal, electroplating processing, etc. The existence of Cr(VI) in drinking water has engrossed the attention of many scientists to remediate it due to its poisonous property and adverse effect on drinking water. The highly mobile nature and non biodegradability of Cr(VI) are not only harmful to aqueous environment but also to human life. Therefore, the reduction of Cr(VI) is highly required for environmental remediation.
Hydrogenation of organic compounds involves in many chemical reactions to facilitate the formation of second compound. The hydrogenation reaction has been popular to undergo with the hydrogen gas flow and catalyst of Pt, Pd, Ni, etc. High temperature is needed for the H2-involving reaction. The reduction reaction at mild condition for a green and safe synthesis is encouraging.